No Way To Filter-tip Graham Crackers

Nabisco, which makes Ritz crackers and Oreo cookies, among other food products, has been bought by R.J. Reynolds, which makes Winston, Salem and Camel cigarettes.

I don't know what happens when one big company takes over another but I know the cookies never get any better. Nabisco, by no means a small company itself, anticipates having more money for advertising now so I suppose we can expect all sorts of new campaigns for Nabisco products. I hope they don't come out with a menthol saltine or a filter-tip graham cracker.

We can probably expect the advertising campaign to change. How about: ''I'd walk a mile for an Oreo.''

Food companies have been very popular in the corporate takeover business recently so there must be a lot of money in them. The trick for a company that mass-produces food is to give its products names that make them sound as if they were made by sweet little old ladies cooking over wood stoves in their own kitchens. A good example of that is Kellogg's Mrs. Smith's Apple Pies.

R.J. Reynolds already owns some food companies, one of which is Kentucky Fried Chicken. That name is in somewhat the same genre as Mrs. Smith's Apple Pies.

Banks are having so much trouble these days, I wonder if they've given any thought to changing the type of names they always have chosen to be known by. They usually try to pick something that makes them sound big and safe. First National Bank or The Amalgamated American Home Savings Bank are typical bank names. It might be a good idea if one of those Ohio or Maryland savings banks started calling itself Mrs. Smith's Home Savings Bank. It sounds honest and reliable, even if their assets, like Mrs. Smith's pies, are frozen.

I always hope a big company doesn't change a successful product when it takes over the company that makes it but they usually do. I like continuity in any form and I even get sentimental over food products I've seen on the shelves since I was a kid.

I read that a man is suing Coca-Cola for changing its formula. He says he is being deprived of his right to have Coke the way he always has liked it.

It sounds like a silly lawsuit but I go along with his idea. Coca-Cola is an institution in America that exceeds the importance of the company that makes it. I don't want R.J. Reynolds fooling around with the Oreo cookie formula. All Americans have a right to the Oreo cookie they've known all their lives. I just hope the tobacco company doesn't start trying to improve the sale of Oreos by making them vanilla on the outside and chocolate in the middle, or something like that.

The best thing about R.J. Reynolds moving into other businesses is that it suggests the tobacco company sees the handwriting on the wall, foretelling the day when there is no more cigarette business.